Clearing Space for What Matters Most When Life Feels Overwhelming

What to Let Go of Before You Try to Hold On

Choosing one thing doesn’t immediately make life feel simpler, especially when you’re already overwhelmed and trying to hold too many priorities at once.

In fact, once you name what matters, you often become more aware of everything that competes with it.

The noise doesn’t disappear.

If anything, it becomes clearer.

This is where the work of clearing begins.

Not as an act of discipline.

Not as a demand to do more.

But as a way of making space so the one thing you’ve chosen can actually stay.

Why Clearing Comes After Choosing

In the first part of this practice, we talked about choosing one thing, not perfectly, not permanently, but honestly. That choice doesn’t solve anything on its own. What it does is give you direction.

Clearing is what makes that direction livable.

Without knowing what matters most, clearing turns into another form of busywork.

You organize, remove, adjust, and simplify, hoping clarity will show up once there’s less to manage.

But when you know what you’re protecting, clearing becomes more intentional.

It stops being about getting rid of things and starts being about creating room.

Clearing Is Not Quitting

This is often where discomfort shows up.

Letting go can feel like giving up, especially when what you’re releasing is still good, still meaningful, or still expected of you.

Clearing might look like:

• Saying no to something you once said yes to

• Pausing a commitment that no longer fits this season

• Choosing not to fill every available space with activity

For many people, this doesn’t feel empowering at first.

It feels risky.

But clearing isn’t about undoing the past.

It’s simply a way of responding more honestly to the present.

The Quiet Weight of “Just in Case”

Much of what competes for our attention isn’t urgent or harmful.

It’s optional. It’s familiar. It’s there just in case.

Just in case you have more time later.
Just in case this becomes important again.
Just in case you disappoint someone.

This is often what makes life feel scattered, not crisis, but accumulation.

Over time, “just in case” adds weight.

And that weight makes it harder to return to what you’ve chosen, even when it still matters.

Clearing asks a quieter question:

Does this support the one thing, or simply pull attention away from it?

What Clearing Actually Looks Like

Clearing doesn’t require a dramatic reset.

More often, it looks like:

• Not adding something new

• Letting a season end without immediately replacing it

• Allowing space to remain unfilled

This is where many people hesitate, not because they don’t know what could go, but because they don’t trust the space that follows.

Silence can feel unproductive.
Margin can feel wasteful.

But space isn’t absence.
It’s what allows attention to settle.

When You Start to Feel the Difference

Clearing doesn’t usually arrive with relief right away.

But sometimes, after you pause even one thing, something subtle shifts.

You notice you’re not bracing as much.
You stop scanning for the next obligation.
You return more easily to what matters.

Nothing is perfect.
Life isn’t simplified.

But the one thing you chose has room to exist without competition.

That’s often how you know clearing worked.

A Gentle Place to Pause

You don’t need to declutter your life to begin this part of the practice.

Just ask yourself:

If I’m protecting one thing right now, what needs less access to me?

Write it down if you want.
You don’t have to act on all of it.
You might choose to pause just one thing, not forever, just for now.

This practice isn’t about removing everything at once.

It’s about noticing what has access to your attention.

Let the Space Hold You

The goal of clearing isn’t control or minimalism.

It’s relief.

It’s giving your one thing enough space to exist without being crowded out.

You’re not emptying your life.
You’re making it possible to stay.

Clearing creates space, but staying is where the practice is tested.

In the next part of The One Thing Practice, we’ll explore what happens after the noise quiets: when motivation fades, doubt creeps in, and the question becomes not what to choose, but how to stay with it.

→ Continue to The One Thing Practice: Staying